The crowd of little black urchins that always congregated near the band also preferred the latter music. They stared sulkily, or with indifference at the performers when they played some of Bellini’s or Meyerbeer’s compositions, but as soon as they began some oriental tune the sulky look changed into a broad grin, which showed their white teeth; and their legs, arms and heads began to move about in a lively and droll manner.
They contrasted singularly with the grave and dignified look of the Turks that were sitting or standing about, smoking cigarettes, or playing mechanically with a string of large beads in their hands. The Greeks that were present walked about engaged in conversation, which they accompanied with expressive movements of the face and lively gesticulations. The Turkish soldiers also assembled near, being called together by a flourish of trumpets. Before they dispersed they bowed several times low down, touched breast and forehead as if in salute, and shrieked out some barbarous word which means “Long life to the Sultan.” Far apart, on a green slope, sat the Turkish women, with their children and black slaves. These women, wrapped in satin cloaks, their heads and faces covered by their white veils, the gaily dressed little children with their bright happy faces and dark sparkling eyes, the black female slaves in cotton dresses of the Turkish cut, and most gorgeous colours and patterns, produced altogether a charming picture. When we had listened for a while to the music we usually took a walk into the country. Our road led sometimes through lanes formed by high cactus and aloe hedges, or across corn fields where the corn (it was the beginning of April) was already beginning to ripen; over green meadows full of brilliant and beautiful flowers, or through cool orange and sombre olive groves, till we reached one of the many and beautiful gardens for which the island has been renowned in all ages.4 Out of the snow-white foam lying on the breast of the azure waves which kiss the shores of Cyprus, rose Aphrodite the goddess of love and beauty, but Flora must have been born in Crete, or why should the flowers that bloom in its gardens have more brilliant hues and exhale sweeter odours than all the other flowers of our beautiful earth. Yet thus it is. I shall never forget the evening when I first entered through a humble gate in a whitewashed wall, the garden of Sakhir Bey. Then for the first time I knew why Eden was a garden, no splendid palace, but a garden with the sweet smell of flowers, with the shade of noble trees, and the sound of murmuring waters. Oh! thought I, that I might be allowed to dream my life away here, that that gate would shut out for ever the noisy bustling world.
This garden was very different from our gardens at home, nor was it the most beautiful of Crete, but it was the first I saw there, and it made the deepest and most lasting impression upon me.
Art has done little, Nature prodigiously much. The flowers grow so luxuriantly, that man’s hand cannot keep them in bounds. They grow high, intertwine, and intermingle; they stretch their long branches full of rich blossoms across the paths; they touch your shoulder and catch your veil, but they are wonderfully sweet and lovely. The scent of the orange blossoms and roses is so strong, that it has a physical effect upon your nerves, and gives you a feeling of unspeakable enjoyment and bliss. The son of Sakhir Bey, the happy proprietor of this little Paradise, received us most kindly. He was the first Turk I ever spoke to. At the beginning of our conversation, carried on in French, I felt a little embarrassed, for I remembered that he belonged to a nation that treats women as slaves, and seems to despise them as such. He however soon made me forget it, by his perfect politeness and courtesy. He told one of his gardeners to bring us fruits of different kinds, some of which I had not seen or tasted before, and when I left I carried away with me a bouquet as large as my hand would hold, and so sweet, that for days after when it stood in my room, I felt as if I were again in Sakhir Bey’s garden. I visited many other gardens, I saw the beautiful “Pine-tree Garden” of Hamet Bey, “the garden of the Red Country” belonging to Memet Bey, and the splendid one of Pasha Mustapha, but none that pleased me more than the first.
Far, far from here, they still bloom in the sun, and in the soft clear moonlight, those gardens of Crete! That my foot ever trod their flower-strewed paths, that my hand plucked their glorious roses, seems now a dream. The stately Bey alone walks them now, and at times when the gates are firmly closed, some veiled woman with slow measured steps, and dark burning eyes, followed by some black slave, whose ugly features appear the more repugnant in that world of beauty.
The day after we arrived at Canea my husband paid, as is customary in the East, a visit to Ismael Pasha, who is Governor-General of Crete. The history of this remarkable man is singular and romantic. He was born at Chio, of Greek parents, made a slave by the Turks when a boy of eleven years of age, and sold to a Turkish doctor in Constantinople, who taught him what little he himself knew of his profession, and employed him as an assistant. When Ismael had grown to be a young man, he showed so much talent and ability, that his master most justly thought his young assistant might, if he received an European education, become a competitor of the French, German, and Italian doctors in Constantinople, who were more frequently consulted, and better paid by the wealthy Turks, than the practitioners of their own nation. He therefore sent the young man to Paris, where he studied for five years. When he returned to Constantinople, he far surpassed his master’s most sanguine expectations; and his great ability and success were soon generally acknowledged, and he rose in a short time to the dignity of physician to the late Sultan; and afterwards, when it was seen that his talents in other directions were equally remarkable, he became the Governor of Provinces. In Crete, where he has been for several years, he is respected and loved by all well disposed people. He encourages agriculture, makes roads, punishes crime, and judges justly. Under his mild and firm rule, the Greek inhabitants have almost become reconciled to the hated dominion of the Turks; and have petitioned the Sublime Porte to prolong his Pashalik. A few days after his visit, my husband received an invitation to dine in the Seraglio. The note of invitation ran as follows: “Le Gouverneur Général de Crête prie Monsieur V. de lui faire l’honneur de venir diner chez lui, demain Jeudi, vers le coucher du soleil.
“Sérail, Mercredi.”
I thought it quite a poetical and Oriental mode of fixing a dinner hour “vers le coucher du soleil;” as however the Turks count their hours differently and in a way that is most puzzling to a European, this was perhaps the best way to prevent a mistake, for the sun sets at the same hour over the faithful and over the infidels. The latter flattering appellation is bestowed upon all who are not Mussulmans. The evening Mr. V. dined with the Pasha was not a gay one for me. Being tired after a long day’s ride on a mule, I sat down at my open window looking at the moon. She shines much brighter there than in England, but it seems she exercises the same influence there as here; I became quite melancholy and sentimental; I longed for my children, and asked the moon to kiss them for me in their little cribs in England.
The next morning I paid my first visit to the Pasha’s Harem. My husband conducted me to the entrance of the Seraglio, that leads into the Harem, the part of the palace occupied by the women, when an old grey-bearded Turk opened the door from the outside with a large key, and locked it again as soon as he had let me in. I must confess I did not quite like the fashion in which that stern old man with daggers and pistols in his belt, had closed the outer world behind me, and I cast “a longing, lingering look behind” at the strongly barred door.
4
“Oranges, lemons, pomegranates, and all other fruits, are produced in the greatest abundance, and sold at the vilest prices. The gardens are rich and beautiful, and adorned with many plants unknown in other countries.”—